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Ask HN: What else besides writing code or managing people?

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Re: Ask HN: What else besides writing code or managing people?

#41

> I'm starting to panic that I'm running out of time to "get my shit together." There is no time limit on getting your shit together. Seriously. Please don't buy into the valley hype of everybody-is-a-success-in-their-twenties. It's bullshit. > So, I'm interested to see the discussion about what those of us who are life long hackers (with a ton of varied experiences) can do besides keep writing code or moving into pe…

Please don't buy into the valley hype of everybody-is-a-success-in-their-twenties. It's bullshit. VCs and in-crowd founders, not engineers, created that age discrimination culture. It's a way for the people who have made it already to put phony time pressure on the people coming up the ladder. The only way to get a highly talented person to throw 100 hours per week behind someone else's shitty idea is to convince him…

"VCs and in-crowd founders, not engineers, created that age discrimination culture"

Just not true in my experience. I spend most of my time outside the valley/VC world. Seems to be common among twenty-something dev types everywhere. I've not noticed any change for the worse over the last twenty years (although now I'm in my forties I'm seeing more of the disadvantages of ageism ;-)

Re: Ask HN: What else besides writing code or managing people?

#42
post #30
post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This kind of hyperbole only serves to reinforce the OCD some people in tech have about "working" long hours. What you described in your OP is lunacy, which will cause mental illness in many people. It is also fallacious, since it will be nearly impossible to find a statistically significant sample of people who have actually done this.

I'm an engineer, so I'm giving out the only thing I learned by observation. As an engineer, my observation and pattern matching skills are pretty good, so I am only describing what I observed by analysing "successful" entrepreneurs. I'm probably different, because I arrived to the Bay Area only five years ago. It may not be clear to you if you always lived and worked here. In any case, depends how you define success?…

"Every successful engineer I've observed wears socks. Thus, wearing socks is the cause of their success; if you wear socks you will be successful".

I hope the logical fallacies are clear when expressed like that. 1) sample size is too small to draw conclusions from. 2) correlation is not causation. 3) even if something is a factor in success it does not follow that it will determine success (necessary but not sufficient).

Besides, where did the OP express an interest in cashing out? S/he wants a job that is interesting to them.

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